Rain and Hail Don't Keep Us From Working, Eating BBQ and Having Fun

"Hello Lourdes University, Sylvania, OH and anyone within a 100-and-something-thousand-mile radius. This is Habitat Team Maryville here to provide morning-to-nighttime news on this beautifully rainy, windy and hail-befalling Wednesday, March 12, 2014."

I thought that would be a great way to start off a blog for today; anyway let us get to the subject at hand, HABITAT!

Well, day three went a little different than the previous days, which consisted of site construction and running back and forth to get work done efficiently. Today due to the weather conditions – raining overnight and into early morning – we could not go to the construction site. Instead, we were all distributed between the Habitat Office and the Habitat ReStore to help out where needed.

The group I decided to go with was working at the Habitat ReStore location along with a few others from Lourdes including Taylor, Meredith, Ellen, Tommy and Alex. Our group was also mixed with some people from the other universities, including Eastern Illinois University (the one we are currently staying in a church gym with), Westminster and Saint Joe's.

While at the Habitat ReStore location, our jobs included a large amount of clothing replacement, doing a technology check, restocking for sale, and providing assistance wherever the other volunteers/workers needed it. We learned the store carries just about anything you can think of while also realizing that bag-throwing should be an Olympic sport.

As our groups divided into smaller groups and went off to different areas, my group of three guys and two girls had a more floating job, meaning that we were moving around every part of the store from sales floor, storage, shipping, and shelf-building. Within my group we would spread out here and there to primarily help transport extra materials back and forth.

I spent a large amount of time in storage near the drop-off area to help anyone that was donating items, which gets quite interesting when you start seeing things arrive that you remember from your childhood and even seeing (I think!) a possible Bob Ross painting of a sad face.

Wherever I go, though, my bad luck follows. Even when I am away from a construction site with power tools and everything that could possibly fall on you, I managed to scratch my hand on a large heavy dresser I was helping move into a lady's van. I'd like to blame a random loose nail, but let's be honest: I was just making loading people's vehicles more of a hazard than it needed to be!

With all the fun and activities that had happened, it's interesting to note this all took place before 2 p.m. As we returned to the church gym, most took a nap or just got their rest and relaxation, sitting in a bed or chair for a few short hours. After that, the Dr. Livingston and his wife Joan met us at the church gym right before we left to go have dinner at Dead End Grill/Barbeque (a suspicious name, I would say!).

At the restaurant, I tried a sandwich unique to Dead End: The Rebel Yell BBQ Burger. When you order one, part of the money goes toward Maryville High School volunteer projects.

After that we made a trip to Walmart and Kroger to pick up things people needed and to get food for breakfast and dinner Friday night.

As the night came to an end, everyone talked and made tie-dye shirts bought from the Maryville High School Habitat program. It wrapped up a wonderfully enlightening night of team-bonding and community.